This White Paper is classic style over substance. The Government’s analysis that the current housing market is broken is spot on, unfortunately its proposals to fix it fall well short of what’s necessary to build the thousands of genuinely affordable homes we desperately need.

“It’s particularly disappointing that it didn’t move at all to lift the borrowing cap so councils like Hackney can directly fund and build homes for their communities, nor is there any new money for the existing fund to help councils and housing associations build homes for social rent or shared ownership.

“The lack of real substance regarding the private rented sector, whether that is addressing sky-high rents or offering more protection for tenants, was also a missed opportunity.

“We will be feeding into the forthcoming consultations, both reiterating what we’ve told Government many times before and further developing policy solutions for areas like Hackney.